There are approx. 1.6 million freight cars in North America. If you can access a recent Equipment register look at the section showing rr marks vs private marks. I think the official split is 60% private cars and 40% RR.But I believe that is low because a large portion of the railroad marked fleet is actually leased by the RRs from banks or major lessors such as CIT,Wells Fargo,Andersons,etc. I don't believe any of the hundreds of short lines own cars. Those wearing their marks are owned by lessors.
Any car with a reporting mark that ends in X is a private car. Technically TTX cars are private cars.
Also the grain fleet tends to be the newer CHs. Tighter gates and hatches. As CHs get older they are downgraded To DDG,fertilizer,sand,salt,etc service. The newest CHs keep getting larger, because of the 286 GRL and the coming 315.
Another good sources is the issue of Progressive Railroads each year that breaks out the largest car fleet owners by RR and private. When you see them listed side by side on the same page the dominance of the private cars really becomes clear.
Leo Phillipp
The BNSF seems to have a gazzilion of them. Fans call them earthworm trains because of their uniform brown color.
Thank you kindly,
Michael Matalis Downers Grove IL
And you can now find me and my fine felines on Facebook
A couple of the respondents talked
about how few claims there are today. Is this because so few of the grain hoppers are owned by the railroad? I know most tank cars are not railroad owned.Kirby Lambert
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Posted by: qutlx1@aol.com
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